Homes, condos and land for sale and rent in Los Gatos, CA

The town’s founding dates to the mid-1850s with the building of a flour operation, Forbes Mill, by James Alexander Forbes along Los Gatos Creek. The mill’s two-story stone storage annex has been preserved as a museum just off of Main Street.
The settlement that was established in the 1860s was originally named for the mill, but the name was changed to Los Gatos after the Spanish land grant. The town was incorporated in 1887 and remained an important town for the logging industry in the Santa Cruz Mountains through the end of the 19th century. In the early 20th century, the town became a thriving agricultural town with apricots, grapes and prunes being grown in the area. By the 1920s, the Los Gatos area had a local reputation as an arts colony, attracting painters, musicians, writers, actors and their bohemian associates as residents over the years. The violinist Yehudi Menuhin lived there as a boy; the actresses Joan Fontaine and Olivia de Havilland (sisters) were graduates of Los Gatos High School, John Steinbeck wrote The Grapes of Wrath there (the location is now located in Monte Sereno), and Beat hero Neal Cassady lived there in the 1950s. Along with much of the Santa Clara Valley, Los Gatos became a suburban community for San Jose beginning in the 1950s, and the town was mostly built-out by the 1980s.

Los Gatos is located at 37°14′10″N 121°57′42″W (37.236044, −121.961768). Los Gatos is bisected by State Route 17, which runs through the town from south to north.
State Route 85 roughly marks the northern boundary of the town, although a few pockets of homes to its North are included. Highway 9 (Los Gatos-Saratoga Road) from the coast terminates at Highway 17. Downtown Los Gatos, the area on and around Santa Cruz Avenue and Main Street, is located in the southwest quadrant of town. A left exit on northbound Highway 17 becomes the south end of South Santa Cruz Avenue, leading into downtown. The area around Los Gatos Boulevard, east of Highway 17, is much more typically suburban than downtown, with medium-sized shopping centers clustered at major intersections of the multilane boulevard. Although the town has generally a quiet setting, its principal noise generators are State Route 17 and Los Gatos Boulevard. Sound levels within one hundred and fifty feet of Los Gatos Boulevard exceed 60 CNEL (Community Noise Equivalent Level), a generally unacceptable range for residential living.

Los Gatos experiences nearly the same temperatures as San Jose, just slightly warmer and with more rain. Los Gatos has a Mediterranean climate like much of California. January’s average high is 63 °F (17 °C) and the low is 43 °F (6 °C) while July’s average high is 86 °F (30 °C) and low is 57 °F (14 °C). Los Gatos has a Zone 10 hardiness zone. Daytime high temperatures very rarely stay below 50 °F (10 °C). Los Gatos rarely gets a hard frost. Los Gatos gets the slight winter chill that is needed to grow grapes and have vineyards. Certain types of bananas (the types that ripen in three months) grow well during the summer.
The record high temperature was 114 °F (46 °C) on June 14, 1961, and the record low temperature was 16 °F (−9 °C) on December 22, 1990. There are an average of 27.0 days annually with highs of 90 °F (32 °C) or higher and an average of 5.0 days annually with lows of 32 °F (0 °C) or lower. Rainfall averages 21.2 inches annually and falls on an average of 59 days annually. The wettest year was 1909 with 51.77 inches and the driest year was 2007 with 9.47 inches (241 mm). The most rainfall in one month was 26.56 inches in December 1955 and the most rainfall in 24 hours was 8.48 inches on December 23, 1955. Although snow sometimes falls in the nearby Santa Cruz Mountains, it is very rare in Los Gatos. The most snow on record was 2.0 inches in February 1976. Los Gatos averages 330 sunny days per year.

The 2010 United States Census reported that Los Gatos had a population of 29,413. The population density was 2,635.7 people per square mile (1,017.6/km²). The racial makeup of Los Gatos was 24,060 (81.8%) White, 269 (0.9%) African American, 86 (0.3%) Native American, 3,203 (10.9%) Asian, 52 (0.2%) Pacific Islander, 462 (1.6%) from other races, and 1,281 (4.4%) from two or more races.
Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2,120 persons (7.2%).

The Census reported that 29,063 people (98.8% of the population) lived in households, 92 (0.3%) lived in non-institutionalized group quarters, and 258 (0.9%) were institutionalized.
There were 12,355 households, out of which 3,775 (30.6%) had children under the age of 18 living in them, 6,417 (51.9%) were opposite-sex married couples living together, 949 (7.7%) had a female householder with no husband present, 435 (3.5%) had a male householder with no wife present. There were 551 (4.5%) unmarried opposite-sex partnerships, and 84 (0.7%) same-sex married couples or partnerships. 3,695 households (29.9%) were made up of individuals and 1,464 (11.8%) had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.35. There were 7,801 families (63.1% of all households); the average family size was 2.96.

The population was spread out with 6,567 people (22.3%) under the age of 18, 1,442 people (4.9%) aged 18 to 24, 6,722 people (22.9%) aged 25 to 44, 9,417 people (32.0%) aged 45 to 64, and 5,265 people (17.9%) who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 45.0 years. For every 100 females there were 92.0 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 88.0 males.
There were 13,050 housing units at an average density of 1,169.4 per square mile (451.5/km²), of which 7,778 (63.0%) were owner-occupied, and 4,577 (37.0%) were occupied by renters. The homeowner vacancy rate was 1.0%; the rental vacancy rate was 4.5%. 19,901 people (67.7% of the population) lived in owner-occupied housing units and 9,162 people (31.1%) lived in rental housing units.